Tag: Ogilvy

5 Desired Traits for Digital PR Pros

5 Desired Traits for Digital PR Pros

Yesterday was my first meeting with Arun Sundhaman from the Holmes Report.  We had a great discussion largely focused on trends that we see emerging across our clients.  He was very interested, however, in some work that we have recently done internally on crystallizing what it is we look for in candidates for the 360 Digital Influence Group.  These are both based on an analysis of what skillsets we’d like to add to our merry band and the qualities that we have seen make professionals especially successful within the group.

If you’re interested in the “5 Traits” that we have identified, please check out this brief video of me walking through the explanation that Arun shared on his site:

Back to the Heart of Texas

Back to the Heart of Texas

Austin SignThe Miracle family is packing up and headed back to Austin!  While the prospect of packing and physically moving isn’t fun for anyone, we know we are headed back to a city we love and that is crackling with stimulation and opportunity.  As an added bonus, they tend to not have blizzards there.

Career-wise, this move is part of Ogilvy 360 Digital Influence’s continued growth.  As we have added more digital strategists, teams and projects around the country, we have developed a need for someone to be able to move freely about the country to focus on the development of people and processes and I managed to bamboozle John Bell that I am just such a person.  As such, I am thrilled to continue with the team as the Head of Digital Strategy, North America.

And what does this mean for you?   If you live in Austin, it means I want to buy you a margarita.  If you’re coming to visit for SXSW, look me up.  If you are looking for an opportunity with 360 Digital Influence, it means you have come to the right place as my first priority is to add new talent to our ranks around the network.   What I hope it means for you as a reader of this little corner of the web is that there will be years to come of continued learning from a passionate WOMM practitioner working with an amazing team.

Social Media & Swine Flu

Social Media & Swine Flu

I had never heard the phrase “pandemic flu” before my arrival at Ogilvy 18 months ago.  Having never worked in public health or (thankfully) lived through a scare, it wasn’t anything that crossed my consciousness.  Upon coming here, however, and learning about the great work this team did with the US Department of Health and Human Services Pandemic Flu Leadership blog, I started to learn about the role that personal preparedness will play in preventing a Pandemic and the power of social media in spreading that message.  It was also an example of the potent combination of a credible author (then Secretary of HHS Michael Leavitt) with a controversial topic and a social media platform for discussion.

In the last 48 hours, there have been some mainstream media articles pointing fingers at Twitter, where #swineflu has been the #1 or #1 trend for the last 3 days, as the culprit of spreading hysteria and bad information.  While I’m not particularly interested in long tail analysis on swine flu OR in taking medical advice from my Tweeps, social media can be a quick and powerful way to amplify some very credible sources of health information.  Looking at Twitter as a detriment is pointless when it can have power to spread correct information.  The CDC has embraced the tool and the 3 month old @cdcemergency handle is up to almost 40k followers who want to get their health information from the horse’s mouth, but on a platform that they already embrace.

Ogilvy in Asia has additionally put together a very helpful aggregation of up-to-the-minute credible sources of health information on the Swine Flu.  If you are wondering about something you have seen on facebook, the news, heard from a friend, etc, this is a great resource to check that information against the CDC and WHO.

Another source for interesting analysis from the science side can be found over at ScienceBlogs.com which has put together a great collection of perspectives on the issue from a peer-reviewed, science-based, hysteria-free perspective.  And with that, I’m off to wash my hands for the 5th time today.